longer than God. If you cut them, their blood would run red, white and
blue, or so they liked to tell you. There was another color Buchanan
had added to that mix: green.
By contrast, the Zombies had come to Congress with nary a stitch of
moral fiber or whiff of a political philosophy. They had won their
place of leadership with the finest campaigns that media dollars could
buy. They were fabulous on sound bite TV and in the confines of
tightly controlled debates. They were, at best, mediocre in intellect
and ability and yet delivered the sales pitch with the verve and
enthusiasm of a JFK at his oratorical best. And when they were
elected, they arrived in Washington with absolutely no idea what to do.
Their only goal had already been achieved: They had won their
campaign.
However, despite this, the Zombies tended to stay in Congress because
they loved the power and access that came with being an incumbent. And
with the cost of elections going through the stratosphere, it was still
possible to defeat an entrenched incumbent .. . in the same way that it
was still theoretically possible to climb Mount Everest without oxygen.
One only had to hold his breath for several days.
Buchanan and Milstead sat down on a comfortable leather couch in the
senator’s spacious office. The shelves were filled with the usual
spoils of a longtime politician: plaques and medals of appreciation,
silver cups, awards made of crystal, hundreds of photographs of the
senator standing with people even more famous than he; inscribed
ceremonial gavels and bronzed miniature shovels symbolizing political
pork brought to his state. As Buchanan looked around, it occurred to
him that he had spent his entire professional life coming to places
such as this, hat in hand, essentially begging.
It was early yet, but the man’s staff was busy in the outer suite
preparing for a hectic day with Keystone State constituents, a day
laced with lunches, speeches, appearances and pop-in-and-out dinners,
meet-and-greets, drinks and parties. The senator was not up for
reelection, but it was always nice to put on a good show for the people
back home.
“I appreciate your meeting with me on such short notice, Harvey.”
“Hard to refuse you, Danny.”
“I’ll get right to it. Pickens’s bill is looking to knock out my
funding, along with about twenty other aid packages. We can’t let that
happen. The results speak for themselves. The infant mortality rate
has been cut seventy percent. My God, the wonders of vaccine and
antibiotics. Jobs are being created, the economy is moving from
thuggery to legitimate business. Exports are up by a third, and
imports from us are up twenty percent. So you see it’s creating jobs
here too. We can’t let the plug be pulled now. Not only is it morally
wrong, it’s stupid from our side. If we can get countries like this on
their feet, we won’t have a trade imbalance. But you need reliable
sources of electricity first. You need an educated population.”
“AID is accomplishing a lot,” the senator pointed out. Buchanan was
intimately familiar with AID, or the Agency for International
Development. Formerly an independent agency, it now reported to the
Secretary of State, who also more or less controlled its very
substantial budget. AID was the flagship of American foreign aid, with
the vast majority of funds flowing through its long-standing programs.
Every year it was like musical chairs to see where AID’s limited budget
dollars would end up. Buchanan had been caught without a seat many
times, and he was so weary of it. The grant process was intensive and
highly competitive, and unless you fit the template set up by AID for
the programs it wanted to sponsor, you were out of luck.
“AID can’t do it all. And my clients are too small a bite for IMF and
the World Bank. Besides, now all I hear is ‘sustainable development.”
No dollars unless it goes for sustainable development. Hell, last time
I looked, food and medicine were necessary for life. Doesn’t that
qualify?”
“You’re preaching to the choir, Danny. But people count pennies around
here too. The days of fat are over,” Milstead said solemnly.